Increase is not failure
I was at the press conference of the Basel Convention yesterday. It's part of our contract with the Basel Convention so I was there professionally. The conference included the usual fare of speeches from the Basel Convention secretariat and invited dignitaries including ambassadors et al. So far so good. Then comes time for the media's questions.
The first questions were the usual data questions asking for the usual set of figures. The media loves numbers; they make an easy intro paragraph. But then one question came along… It was one of those "I'm going to getcha!" questions. The journalist addressed the question to the Executive Secretary of the Convention. He comments on the increase of transboundary waste movements and wonders if the fact that there has been an increase demonstrates the failure of the Convention whose goal it is to reduce and manage said waste.
My first reaction was to stupidly agree. Ouch. Indeed, an increase means failure. So I wait for the answer. It comes. It is prudent but credible. But I want more. I want to rebut the question. I want to show 'him' that an increase is not a failure. That a failure would be an even larger increase than his increase. But how do I defend that?
My line of defense would be to say that it's not as easy as up or down when it comes to changing the world. It takes time, conditions change, commitments waiver and we change. In the case of waste my own very personal take is that we, yes we-we-we are to blame along with industry. Look back at when the Convention was adopted in 1989. Mobile phones? Computers? Game consoles? Twenty years fast forward to today and what do you have? I don't know about you but I currently have two mobile phones, we have a game console, three computers at home and every appliance in the house has more computing power than NASA had in 1969 when they put a man on the moon. So my own personal reply to that reporter is: how many phones do you have? Do you have a new television? Do you maybe have a PSP or a Nintendo DS? I bet your watch is electronic. I even bet that you have a couple of digital cameras!
If industry, and we, were ready to slow down a little, we'd have less waste, less climate change, less pollution, less stress and maybe fewer stupid questions.
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